Solar-powered multi-organism symbiont mimic system for beyond natural synthesis of polypeptides from CO<sub>2</sub> and N<sub>2</sub>.

Yu, Wen; Zeng, Yue; Wang, Zenghao; Xia, Shengpeng; Yang, Zhiwen; Chen, Weijian; Huang, Yiming; Lv, Fengting et al. · Sci Adv · 2023

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Developing artificial symbionts beyond natural synthesis limitations would bring revolutionary contributions to agriculture, medicine, environment, etc. Here, we initiated a solar-driven multi-organism symbiont, which was assembled by the CO<sub>2</sub> fixation module of <i>Synechocystis</i> sp., N<sub>2</sub> fixation module of <i>Rhodopseudomonas palustris</i>, biofunctional polypeptides synthesis module of <i>Bacillus licheniformis</i>, and the electron transfer module of conductive cationic poly(fluorene-<i>co</i>-phenylene) derivative. The modular design broke the pathway to synthesize γ-polyglutamic acid (γ-PGA) using CO<sub>2</sub> and N<sub>2</sub>, attributing to the artificially constructed direct interspecific substance and electron transfer. So, the intracellular ATP and NADPH were enhanced by 69 and 30%, respectively, and the produced γ-PGA was enhanced by 104%. The strategy was further extended to produce a commercial antibiotic of bacitracin A. These achievements improve the selectivity and yield of functional polypeptides with one click by CO<sub>2</sub> and N<sub>2</sub>, and also provide an innovative strategy for creating photosynthetic systems on demand.

Medical subject headings